Friday, July 29, 2011

This article by Thomas de Waal was published a few days ago on azadliq.org. As far as I know it does not appear anywhere in English. It concerns the failed negotiations between Azerbaijan and Armenia to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict held in Kazan last month. De Waal is a highly respected scholar and author of the definitive book on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Black Garden. I recommend this book to anyone interested in understanding the recent history of the region. I am uncertain about the translations highlighted in blue. As always, suggestions are welcome. UPDATE: As it turns out, I found a version of this article here. The differences between the English original and the Azeri translation are interesting to note. Of course my version reflects the Azeri translation.

There were great hopes before the June 24 meeting in Kazan of the presidents of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia that, at long last, a document of Basic Principals, a framework for an agreement would be signed. But nothing happened.

Several sources, including one source in Baku, confirm that, it was Azerbaijan who prevented an agreement. According to a witness, the Russian foreign affairs minister, Lavrov, who has been working intensively on a draft of the agreement, was decisively defeated.

It appears that the Azerbaijani president came to the talks with 9 or 10 ammendmants. The Armenian side opposed this. Even though the meeting lasted for 4 hours, the talks were over as soon as they started.

The Armenian side said that it accepts the draft discussed in Kazan. This was an about-face from the former situation at the end of 2009 to 2010. At that time Baku was saying that it accepted the draft agreed to in Athens and that Yerevan was the one who refused.

First, there are specific concerns for Baku in the final draft that Lavrov prepared. Of them basically, according to what Baku said, the status of the “nonexistant Laçın corridor” was not written clearly in the draft.

This issue is connected to two of the Basic Principles. The first principle concerns the return of 7 regions. It says that, of the 7 regions 5 must be immediately returned. The second principal however says that Kəlbəcər and Laçın must be returned 5 years later. At the same time it says that Laçın must be a corridor uniting Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia.

Baku’s objection is that, the Kazan draft does not put an end date for the Laçın corridor. Because of this the status of the “----“ is hazy and it does not promise for the return of the residents of Laçın’s 39 villages.

Even though Medvedev has never said this, Azerbaijan fears that it could be Russia’s secret plan. Russia could bring its own peacekeeping forces into Nagorno-Karabakh and could arbitrarily direct the peace process.

For years there has been an unwritten agreement in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process that neighboring countries and the co-chairs of the Minsk group would not be drawn into the peacekeeping force here. But this has never been formally written down.

Because of all of these things, Baku’s tactic at Kazan was was to convey to Washington and Paris that they should also join in the preparation of the next draft. Let them promise that any peacekeeping force will come from the European Union.

Because there are presidential elections in Russia and it is very probably that Putin will return to the presidency. Medvedev’s relations with Aliev are better than those with Putin. Putin has never shown any interest in resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh problem. It seems that, in his opinion, the current status quo is beneficial to Russia.

These things bring us to the third type of Azerbaijan’s objections at Kazan. Azerbaijan thinks that time is working towards its benefit and there is no reason to hurry. Azerbaijani officials say the arms race in the Caucasus is bankrupting Armenia.

The Azerbaijani president says that Azerbaijan’s financial and political weight as well as its population is increasing. Armenia’s population is decreasing. 5 or 10 years from now the population of Azerbaijan will be 11 million and of Armenia 1 million. Azerbaijan will solve the problem to its own benefit this way.

But the Armenian side could also say that they are much stronger than 20 years ago. Armenia is like Georgia due to its falling per capita domestic production, but it is not poor. Moreover, there is a strong diaspora abroad. Nagorno-Karabakh actually keeps them together.

If specific issues are worrying Azerbaijan, it’s probable that within a few months they will be accomodated. The status of the “nonexistant corridor” to Laçın will be determined, a peacekeeping force “without neighbors and without co-chair countries” will materialize.

A comprehensive peace agreement is really going to take a lot more work. It could be that Armenian forces will leave a part of the territory they have occupied should Baku agreeing to a temporary status for Nagorno-Karabakh. For example, foreigners could come to Nagorno-Karabakh or the UN could open a mission here.

No, if Azerbaijan simply prolongs the time, then another approach will be necessary. Then the co-chairs could say that they are going to monitor the ceasefire, that they could be the guarantors of peace, but opportunities for mediation have already dwindled.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

I just added two links to the two Azeri-English dictionaries that I am aware of.

Both are good dictionaries though AzerDict is stronger for a number of reasons. AzerDict uses the standard Latin Azerbaijani alphabet while LingvoSoft uses the hard to find "æ" symbol instead of the Azeri letter "ə." AzerDict also tends to give many synonyms and occasionally provides translations of idiomatic expressions. On the other hand, LingvoSoft seems to have rarer Azeri words that AzerDict neglects.

Friday, July 22, 2011

I translated this article last month on the lack of food inspection in the markets of the cities near Azerbaijan’s southern border with Iran. It was originally posted on June 6, 2011 on azadliq.org. I have highlighted portions of the original text and the translation that I’m unsure of. I would appreciate any suggestions to improve this translation.

We met with a woman named Ilhama in front of the Lenkoran region central market. She showed us the bag she was holding in her hand and said that she had done her shopping. She had bought tomatoes, cucumbers, and beans:

Of the people we talked with only one person said that they were warned of this sickness. The majority of the people coming to the market buy agricultural produce. 3 kilograms of cucumbers sell for 1 manat and 3 kilograms of tomatoes sell for 2 manats. A kilo of beans is 70 qepik, while a kilo of eggplant is 1 manat 20 qepik. They also sell eggplant brought from Turkey and Iran in the market. Local eggplant is a little more expensive.

For the most part women are engaged in selling agricultural produce. In the market there are enough cherries, strawberries and other local produce. They sell different types of apples brought from Iran, Turkey, and other countries that they put into packages on the road. No one oversees the quality of this produce. In the market there is only a veterinary service. They inspect the meat.

The Astara region’s central market is in the same condition. The difference is, here most of the agricultural produce being sold – with the exception of cucumbers and tomatoes – are brought from Iran. Because this produce is cheap in the domestic market. Here too there is no supervision of the agricultural produce. They say that there is nothing to fear from local agricultural produce.

According to one Astara resident returning from Iran who did not wish to be named, he only paid a service fee to the quarantine workers at the crossing point. They did not check the produce he brought from Iran.

A man with trade objects in front of the crossing point, Haji Fayiq Jafarov, says that undocumented food products being brought from Iran are never checked. In his opinion, the quarantine at the crossing point takes on a formal characteristic:

“They only take their own money. I am aware of the intestinal sickness going around the European countries. It’s true, in Iran there isn’t this sickness. But it’s not only produce from Iran that is brought through the Astara crossing point, shipments also come from European countries.”

“We are aware of food products and produce being brougth from Iran. Agricultural produce is also brought to local markets from neighboring regions. We have not yet encountered any facts that cause us to worry.”

Thursday, July 21, 2011

The standard version of this song was popularized by Rəşid Behbudov, one of the most remarkable musical talents of modern Azerbaijan. However, I first heard this song four years ago in a rendition by Şövkət Ələkbərova. As far as I know the verses at the beginning were written by her or were written especially for her. (If anyone knows more, please comment below.) Her voice seems to directly express the longing (həsrət) and sorrow (dərd) of the lyrics. I am a big fan of Şövkət Ələkbərova and I hope to translate more of her songs in the future.

I have attempted to translate the lyrics as I found them here. I am not entirely certain that the lyrics transcribed on that blog are accurate, particularly the word "sovulub" in the line "O kimin eşqinlə elə sovulub." This is a rough attempt that barely conveys the poetic beauty of the original Azeri with its rich vocabulary for expressing the pain of a lost love. I would appreciate any suggestions, particularly since this is the first time I have ever tried to translate poetry.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

An excellent resource for advanced students is John D. Murphy's Azerbaijani Newspaper Reader(Kensington, Dunwoody Press). This book contains 25 selections from Azerbaijani newspapers from the early 1990s along with a brief overview of Azeri grammar. Each selection is translated at the end of the book and also includes helpful grammar notes for difficult constructions and translations of idiomatic expressions.

The first edition (1993) uses the Azeri Cyrillic alphabet while the subsequent edition (1997) uses the Latin alphabet. I managed to get a photocopy of the 1993 edition and found it very helpful to get accustomed to the Cyrillic alphabet. Not only is a knowledge of Cyrillic crucial for all Soviet-era historical research, many older and even many younger Azeris feel more comfortable reading and writing in this alphabet.

However, I found that transliterating the Cyrillic text into Latin sped up my translations. I am posting the transliterated texts here for other students who may have access to the Cyrillic edition but who are not interested in learning the Cyrillic alphabet.